Apple is yet again pursuing patent infringement claims against Samsung (and Samsung is counter-suing Apple). The pair's newest patent battle is happening in the US District Court of Northern California and it's a similar lawsuit to the infringement case heard last year that resulted in a $1.05 billion verdict in favor of Apple. This time around, however, Apple and Samsung are pursuing claims against the latest generation of products.

Last week, Apple added a footnote to a filing, saying it hoped to include Samsung's Galaxy S4 in its infringement suit. Now the company has filed a motion to include not only the S4 but also a wide array of Google services. According to Apple lawyers, the Google "Quick Search Box" and the later Google Now function infringe on two Apple patents.

The Cupertino company went on to say that Samsung's latest iterations of Google's operating system infringe on two patents—numbers 8,086,604 and 6,847,959—in ways that satisfied a Federal Circuit's narrowed definitions of Apple's claims. Both the '604 and '959 patents deal with selectively presenting information from a search to suit the user's most relevant needs.

The company is also investigating Google Play Books, Google Play Music, Google Play Movies and TV, and the Google Play Store and Android Market. Apple lawyers complain that "Google did not fully produce the source code for these apps until May 13, 2013."

Apple concluded, unsurprisingly, that the Galaxy S4 infringes the heck out of its patents.

“Apple immediately began its analysis on the AT&T version [of the Galaxy S4],” Apple attorney Mark Lyon wrote in today's motion, “including Samsung’s customizations of the Android Jelly Bean platform, and confirmed, as with the other accused products, that the infringement analysis is the same on other carriers. As a result of this analysis, Apple determined that the Galaxy S4 product practices many of the same claims already asserted by Apple, and that the Galaxy S4 practices those claims in the same way as the already-accused Samsung devices.”

Imagine what would happen if Apple had to first sue and win against the company making and doing the initial distribution of the supposedly-infringing software (ie, Google) before it could go after the middlemen passing it on to the end-user...

Imagine what would happen if Apple had to first sue and win against the company making and doing the initial distribution of the supposedly-infringing software (ie, Google) before it could go after the middlemen passing it on to the end-user...

Voice commands have been on Android since at least Froyo, Google Now was just the logical progression for it. It really didn't change that much in my opinion, I still use it for nearly the same commands. So tired of seeing this "Apple takes blah blah blah competitor to court" crap.

I *might* have been ambivalent about this whole process if Apple actually had a product that could compete with Google Now (presumably the target of the lawsuits).It really bothers me that there is a chance they could have one of the single most useful products on the market completely gutted. AND they have nothing that compares.

I'm not opposed to defending patents in principle, but those patents look to me like they're either obvious and unprotectable, or that it'll be difficult to prove that Samsung (or Google) have used the same mechanisms and therefore violated the patent. But it's not my field, and I had a really hard time understanding the patent text.

This is so broad that it applies to everything. TV, Radio, Every Single computer or Internet services, you name it. Even Google can be sued for this patent. Apple can sue the entire computer industry and planet earth with something like this. This is just plain ridiculous, that this patents are approved.

Lets paste it here:The present invention provides convenient access to items of information that are related to various descriptors input by a user, by means of a unitary interface which is capable of accessing information in a variety of locations, through a number of different techniques. Using a plurality of heuristic algorithms to operate upon information descriptors input by the user, the present invention locates and displays candidate items of information for selection and/or retrieval. Thus, the advantages of a search engine can be exploited, while listing only relevant object candidate items of information.

Someone on this planet needs to put a stop to this. In particular to Apple which is abusing the patent system from left to right. I really hope allot of companies come together in a partnership and sue Apple for everything and make them an example to the world.

Apple does not compete or invent. Every single thing Apple created was already invented before them, they just slightly improved it. Now instead of creating new things and innovating. They go in a legal killing spree to cripple competition. This is not how a business should run. It should embrace competition. Apple is possible the worst company the technology world ever saw come to life. They just want to stop every single advance in this field claiming they own everything.

This is a desperate move from Apple since it seems they already made their minds they cannot compete vs Android, so sue its biggest vendors. Apple does not have the balls to sue Google directly, this is the sad true.

What's ironic about all this is that, if this kind of patent nonsense had gone on back when this whole "personal computing" business was just getting off the ground, there's no way the iPhone would have been possible in 2007.

What's ironic about all this is that, if this kind of patent nonsense had gone on back when this whole "personal computing" business was just getting off the ground, there's no way the iPhone would have been possible in 2007.

Not only the iPhone, but nothing. Apple would not exists, tablets would not exists, not even laptops, neither search engines, or websites, or browsers (yes you can search from browsers as well....regardless of what the patent says, omnibar....)

If this patents were used in 97 we would not be even commenting here on Ars Technica.

This patents are so broad just to be ridiculous, because it can be interpreted as anything you wish or want. The context is on purpose as general as possible.

Smartphones existed for years before the iPhone, and most of them were pretty awful. Apple waited to enter the market until advances such as capacitive touchscreens and reasonably powerful SOCs were available at a reasonable price point to allow for a significantly improved user experience. The thing is, I find it hard to believe that iPhone-like products wouldn't have shown up eventually. Apple just got theirs out first. They have a knack for entering a market at the right time, when the technology is ready for a slick product.

There's no use arguing that Google hasn't copied from iOS. But iOS was hardly the original, and Apple has done plenty of copying from Google (and Microsoft, and Palm, etc.) as well.

Smartphones existed for years before the iPhone, and most of them were pretty awful. Apple waited to enter the market until advances such as capacitive touchscreens and reasonably powerful SOCs were available at a reasonable price point to allow for a significantly improved user experience. The thing is, I find it hard to believe that iPhone-like products wouldn't have shown up eventually. Apple just got theirs out first. They have is a knack for entering a market at the right time, when the technology is ready for a slick product.

There's no use denying that Google hasn't copied from iOS. But iOS was hardly the original, and Apple has done plenty of copying from Google as well.

The iPhone was well-timed and slick. But they have also put out products when technology was not ready for it. Case in point: the Newton MessagePad.

The present invention provides convenient access to items of information that are related to various descriptors input by a user, by means of a unitary interface which is capable of accessing information in a variety of locations, through a number of different techniques. Using a plurality of heuristic algorithms to operate upon information descriptors input by the user, the present invention locates and displays candidate items of information for selection and/or retrieval. Thus, the advantages of a search engine can be exploited, while listing only relevant object candidate items of information.

they basically tried to patent thinking. There goes any chance of robots